Server commands

Server commands are special commands to the server that can be entered by any player via the chat to cause the server to do something. There are a few commands which can be issued by everyone, but some commands only work if you have certain privileges granted on the server. Use “/privs” to see your own privileges. If not noted otherwise, the commands in this article are assumed to require no privileges. This article will only cover the commands that come with Minetest 0.4.7. Mods may add additional commands; refer to the mod’s documentation or use “/help all” in this case.

Issuing a command

To issue a command, simply type it like a chat message. Alternatively, you can just press the “/” key (only in default controls) which simply opens a chatbox where the “/” has already been typed for you and then type the command right away. Although you use the chat box to issue the command, the command itself will not appear in the chat. Since every command starts with “/”, this means that ordinary chat messages can’t start with “/”; they will be interpreted as a command instead, even if such a command does not exist. You can tell wheather or not a command was successful by the server’s respone. If you see something “-!- Invalid command: /blargh” in the chat, you probably mis-spelled something. The most commands will cause the server to write you something else on the chat log for you, if successful.

General syntax

All commands start with “/”. After that, one word follows which is itself followed by some or none arguments. You’ll find the exact syntax in the command reference.
In the following command reference, text enclosed in <> and [] are place-holders which have to replaced with an actual value. Arguments in <> are required whereas arguments in [] are optional.

Command reference

Quick documentation

Show short documentation of server commands and privileges; it will appear in the chat log, too. In case the help is too long, you can open the console with F10 to view everything agiain.

/help - Shows a list of the available commands—depending on your privileges—on the server.

/help <command> - Shows short description about the given command. You can view the help of a command even if you do not have the privilege to issue it.

/help all - Lists the available commands—depending on your privileges—on the server and a short description and syntax reference to each one.

/help privs - Lists all privileges on the server that could possibly be granted to players and shows a short description about each of them.

World manipulation

/set -n time_speed <speed> - Set the speed of day/night cycle where <speed> is the time speed (read as “<speed> times faster than in real life”). 72 is the default, which means a day-night cycle lasts 20 minutes by default. Requires the “server” privilege.

Server maintenance

All of these commands require the “server” privilege.

/shutdown - Shuts down the server. (In versions prior to 0.4.0, this can only be done by the user called "name" in the server's minetest.conf.)

/set <variable> - Read the server <variable> (→minetest.conf) with the given name and let the server show it to you.

/set <variable> <new value> - Set the existing server <variable> to the given <new value>.

/set -n <variable> <initial value> - Create a new server variable named <variable> and set it to <initial value>.

/clearobjects - Clears all objects/entities (removes all dropped items and mobs). Note this may crash the server or slow it down insanely for about 30 to 60 seconds.

Poorly documented commands

The following commands also exist in Minetest, but these need better documentation.

World manipulation

/spawnentity <name> - spawns entity at your position

Server maintenence

/auth_reload - reload authentification data

Banning and unbanning players

These commands ban/unban a certain player and apparently require the “ban” privilege.

/ban <player name> - ban IP of player

/unban <player name> - remove ban of player with the specified name

/unban <IP address> - remove ban of player with the specified IP address

password

Apparently these commands require the “password” privilege to work. Other than that, not much is known about these commands.